Even if a communist can colloquially describe themselves as being on the left, there’s a distinction between communism and “the left.” This is implied right in the title of Lenin’s Left-Wing Communism: an Infantile Disorder. Whereas the left, a big tent term for a myriad of incompatible ideologies, aims merely to act as an opposition towards the present order for the sake of it, communists have a coherent vision for how to defeat the system: by advancing history’s development to the next stage. The left, because of its lack of commitment to that central Marxist goal, naturally takes on an opportunistic role. Because when you want only to build a movement as an end in itself, rather than use this movement as a means for defeating the system, you become nothing more than an actor who benefits from discontent without helping solve the problems behind that discontent.
So we’ve touched on the decolonizing the US part of this article a lot, but I want to talk about the drugs for a moment.
Comrade Shea is 100% based on this imo and as well I would like to add a sort of ‘other side of the coin’ aspect to this conversation.
While drugs which illicit an extreme response such as hard illegal ones do are undoubtedly harmful to our cause as currently the contradictions are so that drugs are not required to “wake” a liberal prol out of their fantasy (they do have their uses in certain scenarios), prescription psychoactive drugs of a mild variety can play a limited beneficial role.
Antidepressants and other medications, while in many cases are damaging to the body, can artificially stabilize a prol enough to be able to study, plan, and learn. However, this does cause dependence upon the pharmaceutical industry and in turn upon legal society which could become detrimental later on although there are ways around this issue.
I think these should be used wisely and phased out over time if appropriate as deemed by scientists under socialist economy.
These topics being brought up in this article should be addressed as should all other aspects of neoliberal culture which have largely gotten grandfathered into our own as our base model. We know for sure where we stand on minority worker’s needs, I believe we should work to iron out the logistics of what exactly 21st century predominately western proletarian culture is, and reject outright what has been dictated to us by the bourgeois class. Yes it will be controversial but so long as we show each other respect, solidarity, and participate in good faith we will gain more answers than headaches.
this is a reductive distinction. There are drugs, like heroin and crack cocaine, that participate in a dialectic of addictive disease. But these drugs themselves are derived from plants (poppies and coca, specifically) and these plants have been used for their medicinal properties for millennia. Those medicinal properties are not limited to the Western concept of “physical” diseases as opposed to “mental” diseases. Indigenous medicine does not make this artificial and harmful distinction. The problem isn’t the drug, nor is the solution prescriptions. The problem is human ailments which themselves are dialectical in nature. Solving those humans problems, historically, have always included medicines like cannabis, opium, coca leaf, psilocybin, etc.
Hard drugs as you and I know them are primarily a Western concept and they were mostly developed as a form of dominance of colonized peoples. Under communism, instead of banning heroin, we focus on healing addictive diseases. Instead of require prescriptions from authorized doctors for cannabis, we provide education and social support.
Remember that this drugs only have effects on humans because they participate in a dialectic with human animals. The cannabis plant produces cannabinoids. The human body ALSO produces cannabinoids. Cannabinoids play an important part in the human endocrine system. As every single person develops idiosyncratically, the idea that a communist society, or even a doctor, would be able to determine exactly what every individual should be prescribed at every stage in their life is chauvinism. Instead, individuals must be educated and supported while they experiment with their own body and their relationship to the world, which will include what we in the west call “drugs”.
The drugs cannabis, psilocybin, coca, and opium have been used for a long time in medicine and religious practices this is true, however cocaine, heroine, LSD, and condensed cannabis such as dabs or keif have not. These are not the same drugs of yester years.
As well, we have created medicines which surpass these in their abilities to aid in medicine save for cannabis. My personal issue with cannabis is it’s negative effects on memory, it’s diverse methods of activity which vary from positive to negative depending on the person’s necessity vs what they are consuming, and ultimately the drug’s tendency to create a pacifist and deradicalized culture around it which damages revolutionary capability within our class. Basically, it works too well; it becomes a crutch as opposed to an aid. This is not in every case, many can consume cannabis without an issue however one cannot deny the prevalence of this culture nor the tendency cannabis in general let alone condensed cannabis has towards pacification within a certain percentage of users.
This is the primary issue with hard drugs, one cannot function as a member of society while high on cocaine, mushrooms, heroin, etc… If one doubts this statement please refer to the countless video evidence of workers too high to function which is available on mainstream platforms for consumption.
Hard drugs (those which are so potent either in their action and/or their addictive properties) impair and greatly reduce a worker’s competency and indeed traps the worker into a vicious cycle of addiction. One cannot be seriously defending hard drug use.
Now there is a separate question in your response - what is to be done regarding workers and drugs. You seem to be under the impression that I am advocating we simply ban drugs and not treat the underlying addictive disease, this is not at all what I am advocating. I agree we must treat the worker with permanent concrete solutions to relieve them of their susceptibility to addiction. I am saying that as Marxists, we should not encourage hard drug usage. That we meet the worker where they are if they are indeed addicted, but not to encourage further drug usage, instead assist them in getting clean.
Suggesting that a more educated person including a government decide what is and is not safe for the consumption of their society of which they are assigned to oversee is in no way chauvinism, this is an anarchist argument which is a pette bourgeois tendency - the rejection of class for individual politics.
This is a liberal metaphysical perspective. They are the same compounds, from the same plants, that have been subject to the same processes of production that all commodities have gone through. It doesn’t make them “illicit drugs” suddenly. And if you don’t know about hashish, I don’t know what to tell you.
In some ways, we have, in some ways, we haven’t. Psilocybin and LSD are clearly under intense research still for their therapeutic effects. But that’s not even the point. The point is that plants that humans have been cultivating for millennia specifically for the effect they have on the human body, whether those compounds are taken in small doses or in concentrated doses, is part of a dialectical process and banning their consumption is a near impossibility.
Why are we working on your personal issues with anything. You are not the only judge here. Your problem with the negative effects on memory have almost no basis in understanding the reality that cannabis produces over a dozen different compounds that each interact with the endocrine system in different ways. Combine all those possibilities with the unique biochemistries of individual humans, and then multiple that across time as individual human bodies go through change, and you really don’t have any meaningful stance here.
What the fuck are you talking about? You think the DRUG causes this? You think the bourgeoisie are out there being like “ooh, let’s give people pot because it pacifies them!” You are ridiculous.
A crutch IS an aid! Self-medicating is a tool for managing the harm caused by capitalism on the worker. You are literally saying you would rather people suffer so that they can be more revolutionary. Sure, you believe you’re better than that, because you say that we can all go to doctors and get “real” medicine that works better, if you’re really suffering, which is determined by the doctor. But you are literally saying that it helps people too much and that’s bad for the revolution. You may as well say we should be pulling social safety nets so that we can have a revolutionary movement. This is a fundamentally anti-worker accelerationist position.
Why do you think people use these types of drugs? It’s like you haven’t even bothered to analyze the world before you start pontificating about your morally superior position based on “logic, reason, and the countless video evidence”. What is wrong with your ability to self-critique? Why is it so broken?
People use drugs because they are suffering. Addicts are expressing massive amounts of suffering and trapped in a literal disease called addiction. You don’t solve that problem through criminalization. You solve that problem by address the root cause of their suffering and by providing support for people suffering from addiction.
You’re such a boss. Your only argument against drugs is that it impacts productivity. You’re the worst Marxist I know.
This is absolutely chauvinism of the highest degree when entire national cultures involve drug use. The only thing that’s liberal here is your moralizing and focus on the individual.